ASPASIA.

"Twas in the fair Aspasia's bower,
That Love and Learning, many an hour,
In dalliance met; and Learning smiled
With pleasure on the playful child,
Who often stole, to find a nest
Within the folds of Learning's vest.

There, as the list'ning statesman hung

In transport on Aspasia's tongue,
The destinies of Athens took

Their color from Aspasia's look.

Oh happy time, when laws of state,
When all that ruled the country's fate,
Its glory, quiet, or alarms,

Was plann'd between two snow-white arms!

Blest times! they could not always lastAnd yet, ev'n now, they are not past. Though we have lost the giant mould, In which their men were cast of old, Woman, dear woman, still the same, While beauty breathes through soul or frame, While man possesses heart or eyes, Woman's bright empire never dies!

No, Fanny, love, they ne'er shall say, That beauty's charm hath pass'd away; Give but the universe a soul Attuned to woman's soft control, And Fanny hath the charm, the skill, To wield a universe at will.

1 It was imagined by some of the ancients that there is an ethereal ocean above us, and that the sun and moon are two floating, luminous islands, in which the spirits of the blest reside. Accordingly we find that the word Nɛɛavos was sometimes synonymous with anp, and death was not unfrequently called Nɛavoto Topos, or "the passage of the ocean."

2 Eunapius, in his life of Iamblichus, tells us of two beautiful little spirits or loves, which Iamblichus raised by enchantment from the warm springs at Gadara; "dicens astantibus (says the author of the Dii Fatidici, p. 160) illos esse loci Genios:" which words, however, are not in Eunapius.

I find from Cellarius, that Amatha, in the neighborhood of Gadara, was also celebrated for its warm springs, and I have preferred it as a more poetic name than Gadara. Cellarius quotes Hieronymus, "Est et alla villa in vicinia Gadaræ

THE

GRECIAN GIRL'S DREAM

OF THE BLESSED ISLANDS.1

TO HER LOVER.

όχι τε καλος

Πυθαγόρης, όσσοι τε χορον στηριξαν έρωτος.
Απολλων περι Πλωτίνου. Οracul. Metric. a Joan.
Opsop. collecta.

Was it the moon, or was it morning's ray,
That call'd thee, dearest, from these arms away?
Scarce hadst thou left me, when a dream of night
Came o'er my spirit so distinct and bright,
That, while I yet can vividly recall

Its witching wonders, thou shalt hear them all.
Methought I saw, upon the lunar beam,
Two winged boys, such as thy muse might dream,
Descending from above, at that still hour,
And gliding, with smooth step, into my bower.
Fair as the beauteous spirits that, all day,
In Amatha's warm founts imprison'd stay,"
But rise at midnight, from th' enchanted rill,
To cool their plumes upon some moonlight hill.

At once I knew their mission ;-'twas to bear My spirit upward, through the paths of air, To that elysian realm, from whence stray beams So oft, in sleep, had visited my dreams. Swift at their touch dissolved the ties, that clung All earthly round me, and aloft I sprung; While, heav'nward guides, the little genii flew Thro' paths of light, refresh'd by heaven's own dew, And fann'd by airs still fragrant with the breath Of cloudless climes and worlds that know not death.

Thou know'st, that, far beyond our nether sky, And shown but dimly to man's erring eye, A mighty ocean of blue ether rolls,3 Gemm'd with bright islands, where the chosen souls, Who've pass'd in lore and love their earthly hours, Repose forever in unfading bowers.

nomine Amatha, ubi calidæ aquæ erumpunt."-Geograph. Antiq. lib. iii. cap. 13.

This belief of an ocean in the heavens, or "waters above the firmament," was one of the many physical errors in which the early fathers bewildered themselves. Le P. Baltus, in his" Defense des Saints Pères accusés de Platonisme," taking it for granted that the ancients were more correct in their notions, (which by no means appears from what I have al ready quoted,) adduces the obstinacy of the fathers, in this whimsical opinion, as a proof of their repugnance to even truth from the hands of the philosophers. This is a strange way of defending the fathers, and attributes much more than they deserve to the philosophers. For an abstract of this work of Baltus, (the opposer of Fontenelle, Van Dale, &c, in the famous Oracle controversy,) see "Bibliothèque des Auteurs Ecclésiast. du 180 Siècle," part. 1, tom. ii.

That very moon, whose solitary light
So often guides thee to my bower at night,
Is no chill planet, but an isle of love,
Floating in splendor through those seas above,
And peopled with bright forms, aërial grown,
Nor knowing aught of earth but love alone.
Thither, I thought, we wing'd our airy way:-
Mild o'er its valleys stream'd a silvery day,
While, all around, on lily beds of rest,
Reclined the spirits of the immortal Blest.1
Oh! there I met those few congenial maids,
Whom love hath warm'd, in philosophic shades;
There still Leontium, on her sage's breast,
Found lore and love, was tutor'd and caress'd;
And there the clasp of Pythia's3 gentle arms
Repaid the zeal which deified her charms.
The Attic Master, in Aspasia's eyes,
Forgot the yoke of less endearing ties,
While fair Theano, innocently fair,
Wreathed playfully her Samian's flowing hair,
Whose soul now fix'd, its transmigrations past,
Found in those arms a resting-place, at last;
And smiling own'd, whate'er his dreamy thought
In mystic numbers long had vainly sought,

The One that's form'd of Two whom love hath bound,

Is the best number gods or men e'er found.

But think, my Theon, with what joy I thrill'd, When near a fount, which through the valley rill'd,

› There were various opinions among the ancients with respect to their lanar establishment; some made it an elysium, and others a purgatory; while some supposed it to be a kind of entrepôt between heaven and earth, where souls which had left their bodies, and those that were on their way to join them, were deposited in the valley of Hecate, and remained till further orders. Τοις περι σεληνην αερι λέγειν αυτας κατοικειν, και απ' αυτής κατω χωρείν εις την περίγειον γενεσιν. Stob. lib. i. Eclog. Physic.

* The papil and mistress of Epicurus, who called her his "dear little Leontium," (Acovraptov,) as appears by a fragment of one of his letters in Laertius. This Leontium was a woman of talent; "she had the impudence (says Cicero) to write against Theophrastus ;" and Cicero, at the same time, gives her a name which is neither polite nor translatable. "Meretricula etiam Leontium contra Theophrastum scribere ausa est."-De Natur. Deor. She left a daughter called Danae, who was just as rigid an Epicurean as her mother; something like Wieland's Danae in Agathon.

My fancy's eye beheld a form recline, Of lunar race, but so resembling thine That, oh! 'twas but fidelity in me,

To fly, to clasp, and worship it for thee.
No aid of words the unbodied soul requires,
To waft a wish or embassy desires;
But by a power, to spirits only given,
A deep, mute impulse, only felt in heaven,
Swifter than meteor shaft through summer skies,
From soul to soul the glanced idea flies.

Oh, my beloved, how divinely sweet
Is the pure joy, when kindred spirits meet!
Like him, the river-god, whose waters flow,
With love their only light, through caves below,
Wafting in triumph all the flowery braids,
And festal rings, with which Olympic maids
Have deck'd his current, as an offering meet
To lay at Arethusa's shining feet.

Think, when he meets at last his fountain-bride,
What perfect love must thrill the blended tide!
Each lost in each, till, mingling into one,
Their lot the same for shadow or for sun,
A type of true love, to the deep they run.
"Twas thus-

But, Theon, 'tis an endless theme,
And thou grow'st weary of my half-told dream.
Oh would, my love, we were together now,
And I would woo sweet patience to thy brow,
And make thee smile at all the magic tales
Of starlight bowers and planetary vales,

home with Xantippe. For an account of this extraordinary creature, Aspasia, and her school of erudite luxury at Athens, see L'Histoire de l'Académie, &c. tom. xxxi. p. 69. Ségur rather fails on the inspiring subject of Aspasia."Les Femmes," tom. i. p. 122.

The author of the "Voyage du Monde de Descartes" has also placed these philosophers in the moon, and has allotted seigneuries to them, as well as to the astronomers, (part ii. p. 143) but he ought not to have forgotten their wives and mistresses; "curæ non ipsâ in morte relinquunt.”

There are some sensible letters extant under the name of this fair Pythagorean. They are addressed to her female friends upon the education of children, the treatment of servants, &c. One, in particular, to Nicostrata, whose husband had given her reasons for jealousy, contains such truly considerate and rational advice, that it ought to be translated for the edification of all married ladies. See Gale's Opuscul. Myth. Phys. p. 741.

6 Pythagoras was remarkable for fine hair, and Doctor Thiers (in his Histoire des Perruques) secmis to take for

* Pythia was a woman whom Aristotle loved, and to whom after her death he paid divine honors, solemnizing her memory by the same sacrifices which the Athenians offered to the Goddess Ceres. For this impious gallantry the philosopher was, of course, censured; but it would be well if certain of our modern Stagyrites showed a little of this superstition about the memory of their mistresses.

4 Socrates, who used to console himself in the society of Aspasia for those less endearing ties” which he found at

among those ancients who were obliged to have recourse to the "coma apposititia." L'Histoire des Perruques, chapitre i.

The river Alpheus, which flowed by Pisa or Olympia, and into which it was customary to throw offerings of different kinds, during the celebration of the Olympic games. In the pretty romance of Clitophon and Leucippe, the river is supposed to carry these offerings as bridal gifts to the fountain Arethusa. Και επί την Αρεθούσαν ούτω τον Αλφειον νυμφοστολει. όταν ουν ἡ των ολυμπίων έορτη, κ. τ. λ. Lib. 1